


Of Mice and Men

by joannabelle



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: M/M, Mild Smut, Relationship Problems
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-28
Updated: 2015-03-28
Packaged: 2018-03-20 01:44:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3631923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joannabelle/pseuds/joannabelle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sauron has a new pet, and Melkor is NOT jealous.  Warnings: Light smut, marriage difficulties (so ... about the average day in Angband, let's be honest).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Mice and Men

**Author's Note:**

  * For [simariethehawk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/simariethehawk/gifts).



> Disclaimer: All characters owned by Tolkien (though I expect he is rolling in his grave right about now)
> 
> Title: Of Mice and Men  
> Rating: M  
> Warnings: Light smut, marriage difficulties.  
> Summary: Sauron has a new pet, and Melkor is NOT jealous. 
> 
> Notes: A response to the wonderful prompt gifted to me by Simariethehawk over on Tumblr.

 

* * *

  
On retrospect, Melkor should have seen it coming.

* * *

  
On the first day, Melkor bursts into Mairon’s study with a flourish.  Candlelight licks an orange glow up the great stone walls and flickers as, with haste, Melkor marches over to where Sauron is hunched above a tall stack of parchments.  
  
Clutched in his right fist hangs a thin, hairy tail – the creature below it struggling madly.  
  
Mairon looks up from his papers with a scowl.  Candlelight dances across his cheeks, setting his red eyes alight as his brow knits.  Melkor’s eyes follow the light as it flitters across the tips of Sauron’s maroon eyelashes.  
  
The creature in between them wriggles in the air – no bigger than a hand.  Mairon’s eyes slide imperviously to the gigantic grinning face to its right.  
  
“What is _that_?” Mairon asks doubtfully.  
  
Melkor drops the squirming sack of fur into the middle of Mairon’s papers with a crunch.  The creature squeaks, and Angband’s annual report spins to the floor before being caught heavily under the dark footprint of Melkor’s riding boot.  
  
“I name him Draugluin.” Melkor gloats. “Werewolf.”  
  
Mairon glares.  He glances down at the quill still perched between his fingers, and wonders briefly how easy it would be to impale himself through the neck and return to spend the rest of his days quietly in Valinor.  
  
And then, rethinking this decision, he settles for a scoff.  
  
“It’s hideous.”

* * *

  
Three weeks later, Melkor catches Mairon lying on his back on the dusty floor of the Angband war room.  The redhead is wriggling around on the tiles, his hair knotted with clumps of dust.  
  
Clutched between his hands is the torso of something small and grey and furry.  
  
Melkor slowly backs out of the room when he hears a yap, answered by a shrill cackle that proceeds to warp and haunt his sleep for the following fortnight.

* * *

   
“It is rather charming!” Mairon concedes three months later, after finally resolving that others had noticed him carrying the Werewolf around continuously on his daily rounds of Angband’s army.  Also to the weekly strategy meetings.  And the kitchens.  
  
“You did not come to bed last night.” Melkor grunts, acting nonchalant because really it did not bother him.  
  
“No,” Mairon agrees. “I was starting his infant battle training – it’s never too early.”   
  
And with that, the Werewolf on his lap lets out a sudden snorting sneeze and a thick spray of saliva splatters up Melkor’s arm.  Mairon blinks.  
  
“Well, I’ll be off.” Abruptly, he pushes himself out of the chair that had been perched at Melkor’s side, scooping the wriggling mutt up under one arm – and then proceeds to exit the throne room without so much as a farewell.   
  
The door closes behind him, and it is quite clear Mairon has made no plans to return.  
  
Melkor hurls his goblet at the head of a nearby Orc.

* * *

   
Five moons and countless Werewolf training sessions later, Melkor decides it is time.  
  
Time to send that devilish mutt straight to the dark Halls of Mandos.  Unwillingly, and hopefully very violently.  
  
And then proceed to pretend he had never once invented a four-legged furry beast at all.   
  
As mainly, Melkor has decided, he does not like the _smell_ of the beast.   
  
Also, it growls too often and in general acts far too much like those creatures Men have that are called “dogs” – of which the Werewolf was in no way based but somehow ended up appearing rather similar to anyway.  
  
That Melkor always seems to discover Mairon in the training pits at a time when he would otherwise be getting pounded into the bedcovers by his very well endowed and sexually unparalleled Master – where any noble Lieutenant should be – has absolutely in no way anything to do with it.  As, frankly, Melkor is beginning to tire of the redheaded, fiery, piquant-tasting Maia anyway.   
  
But, regardless –

* * *

   
The brilliant plan comes to him – like all brilliant plans do – during a long and scented bath.  
  
Slopping about in the water, Melkor displaces about half the contents of the bathtub as he lurches forward in devilish epiphany.  A dark grin splits across his face.   
  
“Genius!” Melkor crows in self-congratulation.   
  
And with excitement he turns to Mairon to let him know, but then remembers that the Maia is neither there, nor probably the best person to inform.

* * *

  
When a haunting melody lulls over the hilltops surrounding Angband’s black fortress and slithers its way into the main hall, Melkor bears a sardonic smile.  The notes are light and airy, and the sound chills the air despite Angband’s considerable boast of crackling fire pits.  
  
He knew she would come.  
  
Melkor leans back in his throne.  
  
“I think I hear someone singing upon the hill,” he observes, in his silkiest voice. “I suppose it is that wayward tart still attempting to woo me.”  
  
He glances side-eyed at Mairon, who sits to his right with Draugluin on his lap.  
  
“That so?” Mairon remarks without looking up, and he scratches at Draugluin’s ear. “Sounds rather tone-deaf.”   
  
The chorus continues.  
  
Melkor clenches his jaw, but continues with his resolve.  
  
“She is quite the looker, though,” he comments with an air of nonchalance, and takes a long moment to pause for effect.  
  
“I would not know, my lord,” the Maia replies as Draugluin rolls over to allow Mairon to continue scratching his belly – though Melkor catches the redhead’s eyes flicker in his direction.  
  
Melkor allows himself a luxurious stretch.  
  
“Well, as you appear … occupied, I shall venture out there and sort her out myself,” he smiles, rising from his seat, and adds: “She won’t have a voice left by the time I’m finished with her.”  And he begins to swan toward the exit.  
  
At the last second – Melkor’s hand halfway through pushing open the door – Sauron shoots out of his seat.  “Wait, my lord.  Allow me.”  
  
“Oh?”  Melkor pauses.  He eyes the beast left master-less on Mairon’s throne, and salivates in anticipation.  What to serve with Werewolf meat, he wonders.  
  
“Yes, do not trouble yourself – I will see her gone.”  
  
Ah sweet, reliable Mairon.   
  
“Well, if you insist…”   
  
“I do.”  Mairon presses – and Melkor lets his hand drop from the door, biting back a smirk – but then the Maia turns, and to Melkor’s horror he motions for the beast.  
  
“… Draugluin will accompany me in my haste.”  
  
There is a sudden, terrible screeching as Angband’s front door is violently ripped off its hinges and comes crashing to the floor.  
  
Melkor spins around to face the Maia, his face taking on a shade of purple.   
  
“ _Bloody … – GO_!”  He spits.  
  
Mairon raises his eyebrows in bewilderment.  
 

* * *

   
Echoing through the Kingdom of Angband rings a deranged scream of horror.  
  
Deep inside the throne room Melkor hurls his incomplete iron crown upon the floor, and then scrabbles to pick it straight back up.  It still holds two Silmarils, after all; and breaking them on the tiles is, he supposes, not going to help.  
  
“Mairon!” He roars, looking wildly around for the Maia.  
  
“My Lord, you sent him away last week.” Gothmog reminds him.  
 

* * *

   
After Mairon does not return to Angband for nine months, Melkor concedes that his plan may have backfired.   
  
On the bright side, he is quite sure the Werewolf is dead.  Melkor had swaggered past its decrepit corpse about a week after the unholy violation of his crown, rotting in the lower levels of the fortress by Mairon’s chambers.  And, if he ever feels the compulsion to check, he supposes the remains would likely still be there.  
  
He anticipates the look on Mairon’s face when he discovers the bones; it will about serve him right.  
 

* * *

   
The day Sauron returns, Angband’s dark skies blister a scorching orange.  
  
Melkor is seated atop his throne when the Maia finally – _finally_ – bursts back in through the doors, his hair ablaze and his cheeks a-glow.  The lingering rot of humiliation wafts through the room, and Melkor catches the blink of a wince that stabs across Sauron’s face as the lieutenant notes the two remaining Silmarils atop Melkor’s crown.  
  
“My Lord.”  
  
There are tears burning in the Maia’s eyes as he prostrates himself at Melkor’s feet, and Melkor feels a deep glow of satisfaction seep through him as he watches the Maia grovel.  
  
He fancies he can smell the faded yet distinct spice of Mairon’s blood – sour and curdling, with but a hint of cinnamon and ash.  The scent burns its way up his nostrils.   
  
Mairon looks up at him, and Melkor’s black eyes glitter as they dance past a deep, wide gash wrenched across the Maia’s throat.  He can all but picture the blood still spurting from the wound, and a swirling feeling of arousal, disgust and anger rises within him.  
  
“I made a severe misjudgement.” Mairon attempts, and again he looks up at the empty claws on Melkor’s iron crown.  
  
“You don’t say.” Melkor growls.  His words are thick and bitter in rage, though a hint of honey sticks to the end of his tongue and he can taste it on the out-trail.  And with the same tone he orders Mairon to march his way straight to the dungeons.  
  
Though by dungeons he means chambers.  
  
And by chambers he means bed –  
  
And he moves to follow.  
  
And Mairon’s first afternoon returned to Angband he finds himself bruised and bit and scratched – and thrust rough into Melkor’s bedcovers.   
  
Though between the muffled pain, there is but the flutter of lips that dances along his neck and ghosts along his collar.  And there he comes for the first time in a long, long time, breathless and silent with his face pressed into the furs that lay upon Melkor’s bed.  
  
Melkor spills into the despoiled Lieutenant moments after, panting into a sea of golden hair that smells of peppercorns.  
  
And he considers the plan a success.  
  

* * *

  
And if Melkor slips, two more days later, when applying a healing salve to a scratch on his arm during the night, and it winds up smeared thick upon the long swollen scar on Mairon’s neck …  
  
Then it is never once mentioned.  
 

* * *

  
“You know, he came to warn me.” Mairon remarks, stretching his head further back into Melkor’s lap.  
  
“Hmm?” Melkor grunts, as he absentmindedly runs his fingers through Mairon’s hair.  They are sprawled upon Mairon’s bed, and Melkor notes with amusement that the Maia is still lightly panting.  
  
“He dragged himself to my chambers, the loyal thing.” The Maia continues, in spite of his dishevelment. “It is quite tragic really …”  
  
Melkor lets his fingers trail down Mairon’s neck.  “Terribly.”   
  
He can smell the peppery scent of Mairon’s hair, and watches as the Maia’s pink tongue darts out to wet his lips.  His reverie is disturbed only when Sauron looks up to glare at him.  
  
“What?”  
  
“It is curious, my Lord,” Mairon starts, a thoughtful look taking over his face. “If I had not known better, I may have thought you jealous of him.”  
  
“Pfft.” Melkor snorts, and Mairon wriggles in his lap.  “Don’t get your hopes up.”  
  
He runs his hand across Mairon’s forehead.  
  
“By the way, we’re under siege.”

 


End file.
